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Catanzaro: From Serie C2 to Serie A

Introduction
U.S. Catanzaro have a sort of rich history compared to other C2 teams. They played in Serie A from 1978 to 1983 plus two seasons before that to make it a total of 7 top flight seasons in their history. They also ended as runner ups in the Italian Cup in 1966.

Goal
Taking U.S. Catanzaro from Serie C2 to Serie A and hopefully win the championship. To make it a bit more challenging, I will be playing with a full Italian line-up all the time.

I thought I made the biggest signing by getting Atalanta legend Cristiano Doni. But I forgot that he is suspended due to match fixing scandal so he can't play until 2015. It's good that I tied him up only for a year.. Juan Pastore is one for the future. 5 star potential. I think he's Javier Pastore's brother.

Not the start that I wanted. Right after the friendlies, we played the Serie C Cup. There is one more match of Group E, the deciding match against Santarcangelo. Luckily we play at home so I hope we will win. As you can see from the group standings we must win to get through, a draw is not enough.

The league starts on the 4th of September and we have a total of 7 (SEVEN!) matches in September. One is the cup match and others are league matches (3 home, 3 away). It will be hard to maintain players fit so we will probably rotate a lot during this month.

I had a season at Perugia on my save and, despite getting promoted, I found Serie C too frustrating.

This will be a good read though so I wish you well and I look foward to updates

It's hard to make a good team because there are a lot of old players on the free transfer market. Plus there are a lot of matches to be played but no players with high enough fitness/stamina levels.

Originally Posted by markyosullivan

Great pre-season. Hopefully you'll experience similar results this season.

We had a great pre-season but we did not play quality teams. I used the pre-season to fine tune my tactics, blend the team and raise match fitness throughout the squad. A big problem is that I based my tactics around the second striker which Doni was supposed to play but I found out about his global ban after we finished all friendlies.

As you can see, I lost my first two matches in September. A bitter blow was the home match against Santarcangelo because we didn't pass the group stage in the cup. But nevertheless, we can now focus on the league. My team showed great attacking quality in all matches. I simply couldn't believe how effective we were against L'Aquila. My two strikers scored a hat-trick each! I hope this form will last and we will end up a league higher next season. In October we have against 7 (SEVEN!) matches so it will be a rough month. I got two players on free to help me with my rotation and add depth in positions I had no proper backup.

We continued our exceptional run in October. Despite the 1 draw, 6 wins are more than enough to maintain an unreachable lead for the time being. I have 5 injured players currently, I hope the situation will get better because the first team players are getting jaded.

Seven matches are left from the first part of the season (before the winter break) in both November and December. It will be fantastic if we can continue winning and stay on top with a good lead at winter break. I could then asses the team and make changes if required.